The Cursed Butterfly
by Halloweenhead131
Summary: Believing herself to be cursed by the god of death. Kaze Yakedo throws herself into the midst of war as a ninja and assassin. She shows no mercy to her enemies as a calm and slightly cruel tactician. Can she break her own curse? Or will she be broken instead?
1. Chapter 1

The white was spread one her face, the brush ran along the nape of her neck, spreading the rice paste ever further along her pale skin. Her face was totally white and now they were taking the moister that had been left over from the paste.

The coal stick was lit and then blown out, it did not hurt as she touched it to her eyebrows an coloured them in to a light brown or to her eyelid as she made a thin line around her eye, slightly thicker at the top.

They painted in her lips, the bottom a slightly round half circle and the top with two points, both were smaller than her actually lips in a blood red. A light summer red was added to her icy blue eyes on the corners. Her face was powdered as her servants handed her a small mirror, the 'W' at the back of her neck was perfect.

She stood, letting them bind her, her well endowed chest being tied down against her body securely. When everything was tied they slipped the white tabi socks over her legs, the spilt in between her hallux and second toe.

She already wore her nagajuban, which they had tied over to keep her skin from rubbing painfully before they slipped the black and red furisode over and fixed the slip collar underneath.

Her servants fingers were diligent as they tied the obi in a butterfly knot at her back. They then fixed the stray pieces of her wispy shoulder length platinum hair with several clips and pins before she was turned around twice to check for imperfection. They slipped on her sandals as a man holding a small but sturdy umbrella waited for her just outside the door.

She could see his shadow through the rice paper doors, her head servant kneeled and opened the shoji doors as the man turned around, holding the umbrella up against the rain that threatened to steal away the perfection.

She calmly and without a sound folded her hands at her waist and stepped underneath the umbrella and they were off through the rain, she lifted her kimono slightly higher to keep the hem out of the water and mud before they got to the carriage. She was helped within and the door closed with a finally clicked.

The reason, as she would tell now was because of a lord, whom had called her honourable father and his troops to arms. But her honourable father had passed away only days ago and the news had not yet been brought to the warring lord, Hideyoshi Toyotomi.

She sneered in the darkness of her carriage, she was now the leader of her people and the lady of the troops. So as respectfully as she could she would ask to be let alone while she mourned her fathers death. Yet she did not hope for her question to be let off with only a sympathetic smile and wave of a giant fist.

No she had no hope what so ever of the lord even allowing her to mourn her father, instead she would be going out onto the battlefield in her ninja and assassin garb to fight a battle she could care less about.

She fingered the mon on her sleeve, triple wolf heads in gold. Her family symbol, meaning wisdom and loyalty.

Loyalty, most men and women didn't know the meaning. Always greedy for power, money and fame, always going by their own wants and not by anyone else's.

They back stabbed and killed, they concerned themselves with money and fame, land and rights. Not by family or even what they had. Always by what they wanted and usually couldn't obtain.

Even though she was wealthy, money meant nothing, even though she had land, the right to it meant nothing. Everything meant nothing, because she felt as if she had nothing.

Her mother had died in childbirth with her younger sister, her sister had not made it that horrible winter. Her father had died of illness because of a battle wound and his last words haunted her.

_You are born in a time of war, I almost did not want to see your face when you came into this horrid world. Yet as I did, I saw something in your eyes, a feeling that held no meaning to you yet. It was sadness, almost unlike any other I have seen before, you were sad to have been born. And I had not wished to ever seen it on your beautiful face again._

Her father had then died, she had ripped off her ninja headband and had thrown it across the room with a metal thunk as it fell to the floor. Her servants had jumped at the sound but no one came to rescue her from her anger and pain.

She had cried, the first time in a long time since she was five. She had seen the death of many men, had been wounded mortally on the battlefield and yet she still stood. She had scars that probably should have killed her yet she still lived.

And her father had in his entire life ha never gotten a single wound before then and had died from only one.

She had been cursed by the god of death to forever see everyone die around her but keep living in pain. To forever walk a bloody battlefield with wounds and scars that could not seem to kill her.

She was cursed to watch her family die in front of her eyes and watch as the pain ate her from within with prying claws and razor teeth.

Cursed at birth, never to die.


	2. Chapter 2

When they arrived the sun was slowly starting to come up above the horizon in colours of brilliant red, pink and light yellow. She had been peacefully resting sitting up, propped up with pillows when the carriage shuddered to a stop and the sound of men yelling loudly outside.

She grumbled something about imbeciles and opened the royal purple curtain to the carriage in a mere gesture of the hand as the curtains were made of quite light material.

"My lady..." Three of her ninja corps bowed deeply when they saw her open the curtains, the black of their garments dull in the dawns light with the slight accents of the grey shoulder, arm and shin pieces.

"Good morning..." She yawned, hiding the sound behind her furisodes sleeves as she closed her eyes. The journey had been long and bumpy, she couldn't wait until she could change into something more comfortable as she opened her icy blue eyes and was helped out of the carriage.

"Lady Yakedo! It is an honour, welcome to Lord Hideyoshi Toyotomi's humble home." She almost sneered at the deeply bowing captain, although it had been years since the last time she was here it was still the same huge building that she remembered from her childhood. And she found the man amusing, he must have been recently promoted with how his voice was as loud as the Tiger cub of Kai's was. She vaguely wondered how Leyasu and Mitsunari were doing before she was walking towards the entrance of Lord Hideyoshi's castle.

The doors were opened before she even stepped foot on the black cobble stones of the castle. Her presence here seemingly making all the servants go into overdrive, as her father had been one of Hideyoshi's greatest allies.

She walked into the brightly lit interior of Hideyoshi Toyotomi's throne room, several torches securely attached to the walls of the room.

"Lady Kaze Yakedo... It is always s pleasure to see such a face in my castle." Lord Hideyoshi sat in his throne, the dark burgundy colours barely contrasting with that of his armour.

Mitsunari had grown, his hair still the brilliant platinum white she remembered although now it was less unruly as it had once been and he was still that lanky kind of skinny that she had always known even though she also knew of his speed and the strength of the man, he was a frightening adversary and even greater ally.

He sat on his knees in his armour with his hands around a cup of steaming tea, just barely held up to his face as if she had walked in on him just about to take a sip while his eyes peered over the edge of the cup at her. Recognition flashed across his features for only a brief moment before it was gone once again.

Leyasu had also grown, she could see the muscles peaking out from between his armour of brilliant yellow as well as the tanned skin.

He too sat on his knees with his hands held in his lap with his tea carefully placed in front of himself so as to not accidentally knock it over.

She remembered calling the childhood friends the sun and the moon, the brightly contrasting yellow against the muted silver of the moon.

"It is always my pleasure my lord Hideyoshi, although I do bring grave news from my home." She gave a small sad smile, knowing how it must had looked to the lord of her fathers untimely absence and his daughter standing before the lord instead.

"I was expecting your father, is it news of his absence? Please have a seat." One of the lords hands motioned to a tatami mat on the floor and she smoothed out her furisode before kneeling with the grace of a fox leaping at its prey.

"It is my lord...he...is not able to come to these meetings anymore, I will be in his place." Lord Hideyoshi sighed, a deep sigh that told her he understood even as the eyes of both Mitsunari and Leysu flicked to hers as if to ask what had happened.

"I told the old fool that he couldn't just run straight into the fray. That he had to wait for only a moment before joining himself." The lord shifted, leaning slightly on his knees with hid armoured elbows. She looked down at her lap, looking at her hands that she had clasped in front of her as the lord talked so endearingly of her father.

"How did it happen?" She looked up, peering into the red cornea's of Hideyoshi's eyes, it was a wonder why people wouldn't run away just at the sight of the man let alone from his prowess on the battlefield.

"The arrow hit his left shoulder at the angle where it could knick his lung at the slightest movement..." She took a deep sigh as she remembered the men carrying him off the battlefield, she had shoved one of the enemy riders off of his horse just to follow them back to the camp. The blood, along with the gore, as she had walked into the tent she had seen what could not be unseen.

"The poison that caused the infection made it spread quickly, too quickly to follow. A servant had given him a numbing herb. He felt nothing as he passed." The lord nodded and stood, both his retainers as well as herself following suit.

"Which clan was he battling at the time?" She gave a grim smile, clasping her hands once more in front of her as the light danced along her features causing her to look slightly narrow faced. Like a foxes as her eyes seemed to flash from the natural colour to white and back to blue again.

"Hiroto."


	3. Chapter 3

A war council was called, apparently the Hiroto clan was giving the Toyotomi army quite the run for their money lately. Going into war with only a few men and then retreating back to where they cane from. And they had been attacking all over too, not just one area but several at a time. It made her wonder what was really happening.

She had slowly changed into her comfortable ninja garb, the black fitting loosely around her legs and then fitted to her torso and arms. The silver of her shoulder guards and hip guard gleaming lightly in the afternoon sun as she placed her ninjatō Just at the small of her back, the hilts facing towards each of her wrists.

A servant slipped the neck guard around and fastened the clips at the back of her neck, Kaze then pulled on the half bandana half eye protector over her eyes and half her nose. Peering out from the horizontal slits that had been specifically made her vision seemed to sharpen, and everything come into focus as one of her shinobi corps clipped her neck to waist guards to her garment.

She slipped on her fingerless, bicep high gloves, the arm guards tied around her forearm and held in place as a strap went across her palm.

She had slipped her boots and shin guards on earlier and the armour protecting from swords trying to spill her innards was easy to move and allowed her to bend over in various ways.

All that could be seen as a part of her pale skin would be half of her fingers, a quarter of her biceps and the lower half of her face and nothing else.

This, if anyone had ever seen her, was her true form.

The assassin that had been built by years of training since the day she could walk. The ninja who snuck through the shadows, undetected until it was already too late.

The Cursed Butterfly. Her enemies had given her this name, she couldn't have blamed them.

Thirteen arrows had pierced her body, each leaving a thin silver scar in their wake. At the time the blood had dripped hot from each wound yet she still stood and fought.

The aftermath of her wrath was horror.

She remembered the soldiers in all shapes and forms - _from enemy shinobi to samurai, many were bent backwards, or with their necks snapped in such a way the heads were backwards. Covered in blood from head to toe, even the dark sky's, the gleaming fire or even the torrents of rain couldn't wash away the blood._

_The fire made it shine sickly across her pale skin, turning slightly grey with a thin slash across her arm. Both ninjatō in each hand, dripping with water and other things she would rather not talk about. She had stood with her face tilted towards the sky, lifeless bodies in a pile all around her, eyes closed against the beating rain because her eye shield had been ripped off at the start._

Her lips had been set in a smile and to this day, paintings of that war still circled around Japan and for the longest time she kicked herself for allowing any such person to depict her greatest dishonour.

That was until she met the child that painted the first one. The child was black of hair and gold of eye, with skin paler than the clouds. The child was named Tono, a little girl that was born the same day Kaze was except years apart.

The picture that had been done in ink, depicted in black and white was beautiful. With the kanji across the bottom saying "_The war of Iwaki, Stand of the Cursed Butterfly"_ and that was the day the orphan had been adopted by the Yakedo clan. Keeping her first name Tono Yakedo had made a name for herself as the "Emerald Samurai" and had settled down with a fine man in Iwaki with four children and another on the way.

Kaze smiled lightly, perhaps that would be her future although she couldn't see it at all. She was taught to feel the ground before seeing the horizon which read between the lines as 'Head in the present, not in the future'. Her mother had always been like that, talking about things no one got but still looked forward to.

"My lady..." Kaze turned, eyes flashing behind the half mask as she did so. Her features that could be seen showing nothing at all even though she could feel the memory burn the back of her eyes.

"Report." She spoke, perhaps maybe too fast as if to sting the memory with fast spoken words or perhaps even wash it away with something else. It didn't matter, her second in command, Tenma Takkio was speaking a report that she needed to hear.

"My lady, Lord Hideyoshi wishes for our shinobi forces to take the Hiroto clans castle from behind on the mountain. Scouts have been all around the area and the trail is easy to pass through and isn't heavily guarded like the rest of them." Her second took a breath, the slightly tanned skin on her face showing a scar that would have,if not for the visor in the way, would have ran from right underneath her left eye all the way down her face. It had come from a dirty man who knew nothing of a fair fight, had gotten several men to hold the woman down while he made the mark that is on her face today.

Lest to say he didn't find it funny to have his balls placed quite literally on a bullseye when Kaze found out.

"It would be an easy offence to take a quarter of our people to incapacitate the guards before bringing the rest to follow." Kaze nodded, she had already known of the signal, as it was it would be a little obvious of a blood red flaming arrow being shot into the sky.

"Move out." Her second was gone with the words and the gesture that she always made with her hand.

A battle was brewing.


End file.
